During the past years, the interest in using mobile and landline/wireline computing devices in day-to-day communications has increased. Desktop computers, workstations, and other wireline computers currently allow users to communicate, for example, via e-mail, video conferencing, and instant messaging (IM). Mobile devices, for example, mobile telephones, handheld computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), etc., also allow the users to communicate via e-mail, video conferencing, IM, and the like. Mobile telephones have conventionally served as voice communication devices, but through technological advancements they have recently proved to be effective devices for communicating data, graphics, etc. Wireless and landline technologies continue to merge into a more unified communication system, as user demand for seamless communications across different platforms increases.
With the advent of multimedia and 3G (and soon 4G) in the telecommunication area, it technically is no longer necessary to predicate the manner in which communications are performed on the type of media that is being communicated, i.e., 3G and 4G telecommunications are intended to be more media independent than previous generations of communications technology. However there will always be issues regarding how to handle legacy equipment and services as networks migrate to new technologies, and additionally there may be opportunities to improve existing service offerings by leveraging aspects of new network topologies. Of particular interest for this application are so-called supplemental or supplementary services.
The use of Supplementary Service Codes (SSC) enables users to gain access to, and control, supplementary services by using service code commands, which the user typically sends by, for example, typing key commands into his or her mobile phone. Examples of such supplementary services include call forwarding, anonymous call blocking and hiding a user's phone number when making a call. The service code command is used by the user to request a specific process (function) to be applied to the supplementary service such as: activation, deactivation, disabling, erasure, interrogation and invocation. A detailed discussion of supplementary services is provided below.
While supplementary services have been in use for some time in conventional radiocommunication systems, e.g., in GSM mobile phone systems, new network topologies have been developed and are expected to be deployed in significant numbers. For example, in order to accommodate the new and different ways in which IP networks are being used to provide various services, new network architectures are being developed and standardized. One such development is the Internet Protocol Multimedia Subsystem (IMS). IMS is an architectural framework which uses a plurality of Internet Protocols (IP) for delivering IP multimedia services to an end user. A goal of IMS is to assist in the delivery of these services to an end user by having a horizontal control layer which separates the service layer and the access layer. FIG. 1 generally illustrates this architecture.
Therein, IMS systems can be broken down into the afore-mentioned three layers: (1) a service layer, (2) a control layer, and (3) a connectivity layer. The service layer contains application servers (ASs) which contain services and applications that can be delivered to an end user, e.g., radiocommunication services via server 100 and location-based advertisement services via server 102. The control layer describes the IMS core network and contains, among other elements, a home subscriber server (HSS) 104, a media resource function (MRF) 106, a call service control function (CSCF) 108, a signaling gateway/media gateway control function (SG/MGCF) 110 and a media gateway 112. These elements in the control layer are typically used for managing session set-up, resource modification and release of resources. The connectivity layer includes routers and switches used in both the backbone network and the access network, which elements are represented in FIG. 1 by Internet Protocol (IP)/multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) 113, the public switched telephone network (PSTN)/public land mobile network (PLMN) 114 and media gateway 112.
As part of the process of integrating legacy services, such as supplementary services, with new networking architectures, such as IMS architectures, it would be desirable to consider and develop new synergies between such services and network architectures.